


you're a sky full of stars

by ChameleonSerket



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-12 23:05:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9094684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChameleonSerket/pseuds/ChameleonSerket
Summary: snapshots of a life lived together





	

**Author's Note:**

> title taken from "A Sky full of Skies" by Coldplay.

Chirrut leads Baze up onto the roof of Jedha temple. "It's easier to feel the ebb and flow of the cosmic force up here" he says. "and if that doesn't work, you could always look at the stars," but Baze only looks at Chirrut. 

He is beautiful, head tipped back, lips slightly parted, basking in the glow of the force that wraps itself so lovingly around him. "Can you feel it Baze? That's life. Let me show you." He locks his fingers with Bazes' and lets the force in.

Baze thinks that maybe this is the happiest moment of his life.

 

\---------

 

Chirrut has a wicked sense of humor and Baze is resigned to his role as the butt of the joke, or the recipient of a painful quarterstaff tap to the ankle when a joke is just too funny, or the one who is inevitably scolded when a prank goes wrong (or right). "I beg of you, control your partner" the head monk pleads with Baze one cool evening, after washing flour out of her hair, but Baze could not control Chirrut even if he wanted to.

He storms into the reflection room and is greeted by a serenely meditating Chirrut. Baze schools his voice into the most serious tone he can manage, "Flour, Chirrut, really? That's a prank I would not even expect our most immature younglings to attempt." 

Chirrut is unrepentant, grinning widely even as he intones "I am one with the force and the force is with me."

 

\--------

 

Baze is a prodigy with the blaster, and the cannon, and the rifle, and any weapon that fires a pulse but is woefully uncoordinated with the quarterstaff. Chirrut tuts, "well, that's no good. No partner of mine will be worse than a blind man at fighting." 

He takes to coaching Baze, taking up the best training room for hours and hours, knocking Baze on his ass and laughing, screeching, when Baze takes the hand proffered to get up and instead pulls down, falling bodily onto Baze a little too easily, letting his fingers trail over Baze for a little too long, a little too softly, until quarterstaff training has to be quickly relocated to their shared quarters. 

"Not a fighter, then, but more proficient with the quarterstaff than I ever expected," Chirrut breathes, later, and Baze flushes a deep red, filled with pride.

 

\---------

 

Baze thinks that he will never get used to the way Chirrut touches him. A thrill spikes through his spine every time he wakes up tangled in Chirruts' long limbs, and when Chirrut grasps desperately at him as he leaves for the 'fresher, and when Chirrut joins him in the dining hall, predictably late, and brushes his hand down Bazes' back as he sits down.

"You're always touching me," Baze says one day when he is at his most confused, "but every time it's like an electric shock. Is that what the force is like?"

"What do you think?" Chirrut asks softly, kneading at Bazes' thighs.

"No. No I think it's just you."

 

Chirrut tilts his face up for a kiss and Baze revels in the jolt that flashes through his gut.

 

\--------

 

They are on a mission, the most ferocious guardian and the most devoted guardian sent to Corusant to deliver a report on Jedha (Later, Baze thinks that he does not know which guardian is which). Stormtroopers come to escort them to the ship and Chirrut cries. He apologises to each and every trooper, finger scraping over their identical faces, "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," and when they ask him why he cannot explain.

Baze asks later, in the privacy of their small suite, and Chirrut shakes his head, grasping for words. "They are so good and so loyal. They have the face of a friend. And they will kill and the killing will break them." 

"Aren't they born to kill?" asks Baze but no, no it is different Chirrut insists, this killing will rock the galaxy.

By the time they reach their destination Chirrut has stopped apologising.

 

\--------

 

The first time Baze says I love you it is by accident. Their bodies are slick, hot against each other and Chirrut is in his lap, fingers in his hair, mouth panting on his shoulder. "I love you" falls out of his mouth before he can stop it, "I love you, I love you, Chirrut, I," he falters, shaking and Chirrut smiles into his skin. 

"I know." Chirrut sits back with a grin, milky eyes searching sightlessly, laughing over a joke only he will ever understand. He touches Bazes' face and brings their foreheads together. "I love you too. I love you too." 

Baze never says I love you by accident ever again.

 

\--------

 

Some days the temple is exceedingly tedious and on those days Baze assigns Chirrut and himself a walk in the holy city. Officially, they are patrolling, but there is nothing to patrol in this ancient and peaceful place. They wander hand in hand, they talk to strangers, they drink caf in a wallside cantina and Baze stares out over the desert. "Describe it to me," Chirrut says.

Baze falters "it's like, uh, the desert is like, like heat given form. Like the dryness at the back of your throat when you don't drink enough water. It's like a star without a system. It's lonely, I think. It looks lonely."

Chirrut grasps his hands earnestly, "and yet it is filled with the force. It is waiting for the rains to bring it to life."

Baze searches Chirrut's face, his stunningly pale eyes, his sharp mouth, his high cheekbones and thinks he knows exactly how the desert feels.

 

\-------- 

 

There are Jedi at the temple, younglings, off to take the Kyber crystal trials. Baze attends the welcoming ceremony without his partner and after the clapping has died away he goes searching. He finds Chirrut, finally, on the roof, not meditating, not basking in the force, just sitting, surrounded by careless patterns trailed in the thin layer of sand.

"I wasn't born blind, you know."

"I know." Baze crosses the patterns and kneels in from of Chirrut, letting sandy fingers trace his chest, his jaw, his lips, lets them run through his hair, lets them grip his shoulders.

"The force always has a plan. The force bought me to you. I'm not upset about that." A small smile tugs at his mouth. "I'm never upset about that."

Baze sighs deeply, and settles cross legged onto the roof. He gently brings Chirruts forehead to his and lets their hands fall loosely together. 'I am one with the force and the force is with me."

 

\--------

 

It is rare for the guardians of the Whills to leave Jedha, but Baze and Chirrut sometimes seem to spend more time off- planet than on. Baze suspects the elders mostly want to get Chirrut out of the way when he's in a particularly prank-y mood (which is all the time). They become unofficial ambassadors to Jedha, offering aid to war ravaged systems, helping to relocate refugees, to the holy city sometimes, yes, but also all across the stars.

They are boarded by pirates, flying a surprisingly elegant disc- shaped ship and led by a man who calls himself Hondo. He seems unrepentant in his pillaging, slamming a palm into Bazes' temple to knock him unconscious, hustling the refugees aboard his ship, grilling them until one child breaks and says they are bound for Naboo. He laughs widely, "I have friends on Naboo, yes, but your route would have led you straight into the imperial barricade. You are lucky Hondo found you, hah, they do not take kindly to sneaky little ships trying to leave their newly- claimed space!"

"And how will you leave?" Chirrut asks. He is free to move around the ship- "A blind spy! Hah! What is the use?" Hondo laughs- but never strays from the door of Baze's cell.

"We are pirates, little spy! We go where we please!"

Where they please turns out to be Naboo. "Tell no one, little spy," Hondo booms as the refugees file off the ship, possessions intact. "We cannot have anyone thinking pirates are helping the republic, hah?"

Baze has seen the worst in good people and the best in bad people. He doesn't know where to classify Hondo.

 

\--------

 

The clone wars come to an end with a great killing that rocks the galaxy. Even Baze can feel the ripples of terror in the force but Chirrut is rendered near catatonic from the pain. He is in a trance for three rotations, laid out on their bed, accepting sips of water through his muttering "I am one with the force and the force is with me" eyelids fluttering, hands grasping at nothing, hands stilled by Bazes' own. 

Chirrut wakes, slowly, eventually, tears shining like stars on his cheeks. "I thought you were never coming back" chokes Baze, wiping hot tears off his own face.

"No, my love, this is not my time. This is not my fate."

Baze swallows thickly. "I can't live without you."

"I know. I know."

 

\--------

 

The holy city is overrun by stormtroopers and they stay. The temple is destroyed and they stay. The people lose hope and they stay. The rebels and the troops are in little wars, all the time, and they stay. A young woman with a kyber crystal arrives and they leave.

Baze knows that this is their fate. Chirrut knows that this is their death.

 

\--------

 

They have no reason, no need to volunteer to go to Scarif but Baze and Chirrut do not hesitate for a second. They spend the trip- this last trip- Baze thinks out of nowhere, stuffed into a cargo ship with a bevy of rough and tumble warriors and yet there is tenderness there. There is love within this band of vagabonds and Chirrut does not feel shy when he turns into Baze, when he presses against his bulk and cards shaking fingers through his hair. Baze turns red but he too has noticed the love on this ship- a hand held here, a smile shared there- and rests his head on Chirruts' shoulder.

They could stay like this forever, and maybe they do, until forever is broken when the ship touches down on the sandy atolls of Scarif.

 

\--------

 

Baze knows that when they die they are returned to the force. It is one of the first things they learn as guardians. He knows that they are to be returned to the cosmic force, to become stardust and solar winds, to be wholly part of the universe.

This is meant to be a peaceful thought but as Chirrut, his partner, his lover, his best friend dies in his arms, as he stares down his own death, Baze can't think of anything worse. To be scattered to the far corners of the galaxy, to be apart from Chirrut, the thought is almost more painful than the grenade blast. 

 

\--------

 

It is blank, death. Like the void of space. Like the desert. 

Baze is vaguely surprised he can think anything at all. He's even more surprised that he can feel, even if all he can feel is lonely. The absence of Chirrut is like a hole in his being, like a wound on his soul. He opens his eyes- he has eyes?- and climbs to his feet- he has feet? hands?- into a serene and peaceful Jedha and into Chirrut's waiting arms. 

He looks up into a familiar smiling face. "I know how the desert feels" he sobs and hugs Chirrut hard into himself.

Chirrut returns the hug, hard, hands gripping at Bazes' waist, fingernails digging, scaping over skin. "So do I. So do I."

They break apart, eventually, and Chirrut laces his fingers around Baze's.

"Come on love, let's go home."

And then they do.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I love Hondo and I had to slot him in somewhere don't judge me


End file.
